New Tune Review: No Funeral

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Full disclosure, I’m a big No Funeral fan. If you aren’t familiar with the Cambridge label, they have been consistently delivering releases from a wide range of artists as far as Japan (Merzbow) and Maryland (Yume) over the past few years. 

One aspect as varied as the geographic locations of affiliated artists is the output of artistic content. The label’s mandate is to promote “honest+passionate art” designed to “provoke thought+feeling” and you won’t walk away disappointed if you take a quick peel through their catalogue on Bandcamp. 

Expect intricate guitar work, some mathy stuff thrown in there, panged and angst-ridden vocal performances and a whole lot of harsh noise sprinkled throughout. Plus, some pretty true-to-form classic screamo tracks for the purists out there.

If you feel like dipping your toes in, “no funeral compilation 2” dropped at the end of Oct. and it shows the label operating at peak performance, with standout tracks by the aforementioned Yume as well as local-ish duo Paper Hats and the now fully-formed Dead Friend Collective. 

Towards the end of the compilation, a System of a Down cover by self-described “Montreal funkviolence party” Dianacrawls arrives seemingly out of nowhere and while it feels very tongue-in-cheek it also seems more relevant now than ever.

This set of 10 tracks is easily one of the strongest and most cohesive releases I have heard all year. 

As is usually the case with a No Funeral release, the main thing on display here is a well curated network of passionate, articulate and emotionally varied artists; separated by geography alone and brought together comfortably under the banner of No Funeral Records.

Kurtis Rideout, local musician, producer and ad manager for WLUSP

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Kurtis Rideout, local musician, producer and ad manager for WLUSP